Monday, November 5, 2007

More Spicy Treats!

As I was thinking of my pal OG and his recent Salsa posts, I decided to make something spicy. Taking a note from Bobby Flay, I decided on a chili-rubbed pork tenderloin with a Flay-inspired sauce containing chicken broth, apple juice concentrate, chipotle with adobo, mustard, and some homemade chili paste. I served with some creamed hominy and a roasted pepper/chile salad. I don't have a picture, but this was pretty easy and damn good.

Start by making the sauce, as you are preparing your mise en place, start by soaking 4 to 6 dried chiles such as ancho or pasilla in warm water for 3o minutes and preheat your oven to 375 F. Once the chiles tender, remove stems and seeds, tear into small pieces and blend until smooth adding some of the soaking liquid until the "paste" is between the consistency of mashed potatoes and tomato paste. To same time here, go ahead and add 2 chipotle chiles and a tablespoon of adobo sauce to this puree.

In a medium saucepan, add broth and concentrate, bring to a boil, then add chiles, continue cooking at a brisk simmer to reduce. While reducing, start on the pork.

Pat the tenderloins dry with as many papertowels as you can stand to waste, then completely coat the tenderloins with the rub. Heat stainless skillet over medium-high heat for 3 minutes then add the oil. Shake the excess rub off the tenderloins and drop in the skillet. Brown the tenderloins well on roughly three sides (note this doesn't take too long b/c the rub has brown sugar). While the final side is browning, place pan in preheated oven...by this time the sauce should have reduced significantly.

The pork will roast for about 10 minutes, but if you are afraid of pork, I suggest checking temperature with instant read thermometer. The sauce should reduce until you have about a cup and the sauce is thickened. Once desired consistency is reached, whisk mustard and cream into the sauce and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Let the pork rest about 5 minutes tented with foil before slicing into medallions.

I served this with creamed hominy and a pepper salad. For the hominy, I combined one can of hominy and added about a 1/2 cup of half and half, 2 T honey, some cilantro, some chipotle chile puree, salt, pepper and juice from a lime. Heated over medium heat and blended with a stick blender until all the hominy was broken down somewhat. For the pepper salad, I roasted and seeded a red bell pepper, yellow bell pepper, 2 poblano peppers chopped into 3/4 inch dice. I combined the peppers with 2 cloves minced garlic, salt, pepper, a squirt of lime and a drizzle of olive oil. I crumbled in some queso fresco just before serving. The combined flavors were excellent.

After making this I found a Bobby Flay recipe that is probably better on FoodTv.com titled New Mexican Rubbed Pork Tenderloin, has recipe for Sweet potato tamale...Next time, I'll try this one and compare the two.